West Virginia University - Monticola Yearbook (Morgantown, WV)

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MONTicoiA( e ew Caw !S allying. Although the College of Law was the first professional school upon the campus of West Virginia University, it is the latest school to acquire a building exclusively for its own purposes. In 1919, the State legislature appropriated a substantial sum for the construction of a law building. In 1921, the legislature supplemented the amount formerly appropriated thus providing a sum sufficient not only to construct the build- ing according to the approved plans but also to acquire additional ground for a site for the building The site is now on Front Street immediately south of the President ' s house. Alumni and former students of the College of Law, the West Virginia Bar Association and the University administration joined in convincing the legislature of the necessity for this appropriation. Henry Craig Jones, at that time dean of the College of Law, both inspired the movement for the new building and, with the architect, Mr. Charles M Bates of Wheeling, worked out most of the plans for the building. All mod- ern law school buildings were inspected either by visiting them or by securing plans of their structures, and the advice of law teachers and law librarians was secured and advantage taken of their suggestions. On April I, 1922, the Board of Control of West Virginia awarded the contracts for the construction of the new building. It is to be one hundred and forty-four feet in length, fifty-six feet in minimum width and three stories in height, provision to be made for a mezzanine floor throughout one half of the upper story of the building. It will be constructed of reinforced concrete with hard brick exterior, limestone trim- ming, and tile roof, and will be fireproof throughout. The style of architecture will conform in general to the more recently constructed University buildings. A wide portico and six dormer windows along the front of the building will suggest Virginia and West Virginia court houses of the past century. Provision is made on the ground floor for a locker room and a student club- room where conversation and reading of the daily papers, etc., may be done. A room will also be available for typewriting. In addition, the men ' s toilet room, the librarian ' s packing room, the storage room, and the machinery room will be on the ground floor. The class room floor will contain two large class rooms, a smaller class room and a modern Practice Court room, as well as a rest room and toilet room for women students. Each of the large class rooms will accomodate more than one hundred students for instruction and about two hundred for general meetings. At the landing on the stairway half way between the class room floor and the library floor will be placed life size oil portraits of Professors Brook and Willey, the first two members of the law faculty On the library floor will be the large reading room, the stack room, and the offices of the professors, the dean, the secretary, and the librarian. The ceiling in the library room will be twenty feet high. Around the stack room, over the offices, will be a mezzanine floor which will be used as an addition to the reading room. There will be space on the library floor for approximately fifty five thousand volumes of law books. An electric book lift will be used to transfer books from the packing room on the ground floor to the librarian ' s station and to and from the Practice Court room and the class room floor. The contracts provide that the building shall be ready for occupancy not later than June 1, 1923. When completed it will be the most modern of the law school buildings of the country, embodying the best features of the others and will no doubt be the source of great pride on the part of the faculty, students and alumni not only of the law school but of the whole University. It should increase the usefulness of the law school to the legal profession and the public of the State of West Virginia. 14 e

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